30 students from the network VNGO- FLEGT and community organization in the Central Region attended the workshop. The workshop was under the guidance of Dr.Truong Quang Hoang (Deputy Director of the Center for Rural Development and Dr. Michael Richards.

Mr Truong Si Hoai Nhan – director of FLEGT project opened remarks
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On the first day, after getting the students familiar with each other, Mr. Hoai Nhan introduced the training and reviewed a number of innovative concepts such as FLEGT/VPA, TLAS and presented FLEGT action plan for the coming years. Following the introduction was a lecture by Dr. Truong Quang Hoang who updated the VPA/FLEGT process in Vietnam. This update helped sutdents learn more about the involvement of VNGO in each stage of the process which is a major factor of VPA and impacts the success of the project. To clarify this, Mr. Michael Richards had an additional presentation around the issue of legal timber and timber system ensuring the legality of TLAS. He also presented some examples of Activities of CSOs/ NGOs in 5 countries that have signed the VPA with the EU (Ghana, Indonesia, Libera, Republic of Congo, Cameroon) through a short video he compared the advantages and limitations of social factors in Vietnamese.
The second day was more exciting because the students were grouped into teams and were able to practice problem trees on the political factors affecting social participation and social organizations based on the methods of “Theory Change participation”. The tree consists of a series of problems and causes a chain solution which results based on the accumulated knowledge of each student. This activity helps students to experience and understand the core of the training in the current role of the VNGO-FLEGT with the challenge to participate in the process of VPA/FLEGT

Making problem trees
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During the end of the training all participations discussed about the activities that their organization have done or can do for the VPA/FLEGT and further shared information about how the training could be applied in social organization and bring forth a temporary feasible action plan.

Training after two days of learning and discussions have wrapped
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